The 87th Academy Award Nominations and Fun Facts

This morning, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts
& Sciences unveiled their nominations for the 87th Annual Oscars. In the
midst of all the snubs, surprises and outrage on social media there is still
some fun to be had with numbers and historical context. Here are your nominees
followed by some info to take with you to share with friends who have not yet
mounted their annual post-announcement boycott of the ceremony on Sunday, Feb.
22.

Wes Anderson's "The Grand Budapest Hotel" is the highest-grossing nominee at the box office with nearly $60 million. "The Imitation Game" is at $42 million and climbing. No other film has grossed $30 million to date.

Total gross of the eight nominated films to date: $203,078,365. Lower than the total gross of nominees "Guardians of the Galaxy", "Captain America: The Winter Soldier", "The Lego Movie", "Maleficent", "The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies", "X-Men: Days of Future Past", "Big Hero 6" and "Dawn of the Planet of the Apes".

Bennett Miller is the first director to be nominated since the expansion of the Best Picture category to not have his film up for the big prize. His only prior nomination or award through the entire awards season happened well before it began: back in May when he won Best Director for "Foxcatcher" at the Cannes Film Festival.

"Foxcatcher" was good enough to be nominated for its screenplay, direction and two performances but not Best Picture of the Year. Meanwhile, "Selma" received one single nomination for Original Song and is up for Best Picture.

This is the first year since 2009 that there is not a film with 10 nominations or more. "Selma"'s two nominations is the lowest for a Best Picture nominee since "Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close". in 2011. It also joins "The Blind Side" and "A Serious Man" as films of the expansion era to receive just one other nomination besides Best Picture.

This is the 7th straight year that the Weinstein Co. has had
a film up for Best Picture. Warner Bros. has been up six years in a row. It's the
5th straight year for Fox Searchlight. "Boyhood", meanwhile, is the
first Best Picture nominee in the history of IFC Films.

Batman and two Incredible Hulks are up for Oscars. Not to mention Spider-Man's
Gwen Stacy and J.J. Jamieson

Mark Ruffalo has co-starred with fellow nominees Ethan Hawke
("What Doesn't Kill You"), Keira Knightley ("Begin Again"), Julianne Moore
("The Kids Are All Right" and "Blindness") Reese
Witherspoon ("Just Like Heaven") and aside from his screen time with
Steve Carell in "Foxcatcher" also had a scene with him in "Date
Night"

Nine of the actors are first-time nominees. Marion Cotillard,
Laura Dern, Ethan Hawke, Keira Knightley, Mark Ruffalo and Reese Witherspoon
received their second. Bradley Cooper and Edward Norton got their third.
Julianne Moore upped her tally to five. Robert Duvall now has seven and Meryl
Streep extends her record to 19 nominations.

Chicagoan Patricia Arquette was nominated for Supporting
Actress and Common is one of the performers of "Selma"'s nominated
song, "Glory". Meanwhile, Jake Gyllenhaal and Gillian Flynn were not.

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